


part 10.

by hdarchive



Series: Heartstrings Verse [11]
Category: Glee
Genre: M/M, Nerd!Blaine, Skank!Kurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-26
Updated: 2014-09-26
Packaged: 2018-02-18 21:39:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2363021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hdarchive/pseuds/hdarchive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And he loves him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	part 10.

“I know it looks huge Kurt, but in reality, it’s puny,” Blaine says, face scrunching up as he stares at the sky overhead.

Kurt switches from looking at Blaine to looking at the sky. He can’t decide where to keep his gaze, because on one hand Blaine is smiling like he’s never seen a star before and -

On the other he has the moon. It’s only a sliver tonight, a crescent in the stars, and he never once thought of the moon as huge. Beautiful, glowing, and when he was a child he loved nothing more than long car rides at night because he swore it was following him.

So far away, almost completely untouchable.

“Is that so?” he asks, wrapping his arms tighter around his legs.

Because there is no more pretending - he’s done - any lie he tells Blaine would be the same as telling him the moon doesn’t exist.

Blaine shifts next to him, the bench they’re sitting on creaking, a noise that echos through the garden until they're met with silence.

“If we were to compare it to the likes of Jupiter, you’d see how microscopic it is in the grand scheme of things.”

Kurt lets out his breath, sucks cool air into his lungs, and leans his chin down on his knees.

Maybe at one point he would have rather swallowed nails than spend his free time with Blaine. But tonight he called him because, well . . Kurt would never admit to missing him, but -

He remembers having difficulties hanging up the phone because his hand was shaking, his heart spinning, a sudden weight to his tongue that felt similar to sand.

And now they're here, Blaine’s hand in his, not a question about grades, not a mention of the future and its impending doom that’s going to smash Kurt’s world apart like a comet if he doesn’t figure it out soon -

He never thought he _had_ a future -

Here in the Anderson’s garden, outerspace stretched above them - and nothing really matters except for Blaine’s hand in his.

The garden is covered in a layer of snow, but Blaine told him it’s usually overflowed with tulips, yellow and red; Blaine and his mother’s favourite colours.

“Don’t even get me started on red hypergiants,” Blaine says, shaking, his eyes frantically roaming the sky. “There’s this one, called the VY Canis Majoris, and it’s so big, Kurt, it would take over one thousand years for a plane to even fly around it. One thousand years!”

Blaine has is neck tilted back, entire focus pinned to a section of the sky, and it’s either the stars reflecting off his eyes or they’re truly shining -

“Compare that to Jupiter and then compare that to the moon and - geez, Kurt, we’re nothing -”

Blaine’s voice is a whisper, a secret to the universe, as if he realized with each passing second that every word was more insignificant than the last.

Kurt smiles, twists a little where he’s sitting so his elbow nudges Blaine’s.

Maybe he’s not Jupiter, and maybe he’s not a red hypergiant, but if he’s the moon at least he has Earth . .

Blaine jerks in his seat, and he nearly yells, “That’s not all! You don’t even want to know how many stars there are.”

Kurt asks, voice dry but grin wide, “How many?”

Blaine’s eyes go wide, fearful, and Kurt can’t hold back his smile, ducking his head into the curve of his arm.

“Kurt - it’s pretty much -” Blaine looks up, his breath coming out in a white cloud, the winter air cold and bitter against their skin. “It’s pretty much endless.”

Blaine never looks away, searching one corner of the sky before switching to the next. Counting each sparkle that ignites the dark, the silver flecks that whirl together if you stare too hard. He breathes, and something about the way he holds himself is different - alive - like the void of outerspace somehow makes him _bigger_.

“In our galaxy alone, Kurt, there has to be _at least_ one billion.” And then he tears his gaze away from the sky, though when he meets Kurt’s eyes - he still looks like he’s staring at the stars.

He’s closer, but Kurt can hardly notice anymore, and touches his chin, tilting it upwards. “We’re lucky we get to see the thousands that we do now.”

It’s silent. And if you don’t breathe, don’t move, just stare up and up and look - maybe it’s the stars you’re hearing. There’s so many, his eyes going out of focus to take them all in, thousands upon thousands and more that he can’t see - and there isn’t a noise in the world, nothing else except for the canvas of dark blues and dots of silver, the snow on the ground.

And Blaine.

“Then there are the millions of other galaxies. All with their own set of stars.” Blaine says to the sky, breathless. “I heard once that for every grain of sand on earth, there’s ten thousand stars.”

Air is too tight in his lungs, can’t get it out, and he says because it’s all he can say, “Wow.”

He never thought of the logistics of space. It was always just - there. He never thought to count the stars, to point out the planets, it was always a far away land that he could never reach because he’s been stuck to the ground. But Blaine -

Points out Orion, naming the stars that make up its brightest points. Betelgeuse; a red hypergiant that forms the shoulder - and Blaine’s grin is wide and even if there were a thousand hypergiants all lined up for Kurt to see, there’s his grin and it’s so much brighter.

Outside it’s the kind of cold that pricks at your bones, the kind that makes your fingers go numb, and he was an idiot maybe to leave the house without a jacket, but he wasn’t exactly expecting to spend his night side by side outdoors with Blaine.

“God, it’s cold,” he shivers, crossing his arms over his chest, hugging himself tight.

Blaine’s mind is still in space, locked with Orion, and when he finally looks at him his eyes are wide, mouth falling open before he says, “Oh, here.”

He’s taking off his blazer before Kurt can protest. It’s an awful green colour, with yellow stripes running over it, and Kurt’s stomach is flipping in disgust but . . it’s cold and Blaine’s already sliding it over his shoulders, tugging gently until Kurt’s covered.

He feels - silly. His shirt clashes with the colours, the ripped black fabric looking like rags underneath Blaine’s blazer. And he thinks _I’d rather freeze -_

Above them is the galaxy, with Orion and the moon and VY Canis Majoris.

Nobody but the stars here to see him.

“Thanks,” he whispers, pushing his arms through the sleeves and resettling so his legs are tucked closer to his chest.

Blaine’s trailing one finger down the yellow lines on Kurt’s arm, pressure hardly noticeable with how cold he is. He whispers back, “No problem.”

If he knew a few weeks ago that he’d be here, sitting with Blaine and having his hand on him and wanting more than his hand on him - he wouldn’t believe it. How could he believe it. How could he have known. If only he knew back then, when he felt that heart-stopping fear that soon he’d feel something else . . .

Voice cutting the air, bitter in his throat, he grits out between chattering teeth, “Well now you’re going to freeze your ass off.”

“But I couldn’t possibly let _you_ freeze to death,” Blaine says, smiling.

Feeling something else, and although it’s been muddled in confusion and tossed back and forth and felt like somebody took a hammer to it - he knows. Clear as the sky tonight, with the moon half hidden.

I -

He can’t. He can’t even think it.

“Kurt?”

Maybe he’ll never be able to say it out loud. Maybe he won’t need to. Blaine will never see every star in the galaxy, but he knows they’re there.

Nobody but the stars here to see him . .

His heart beats. He breathes.

He looks up and forces the line of his mouth into a smile, manages to say without choking, “Tell me more about the stars.”

I think I -

And he isn’t sure if it’s relief that he feels when Blaine looks away, not noticing that Kurt can’t take his eyes off of him - and okay, maybe Blaine won’t ever catch on . . .

“Alright, wanna know my favourite thing, in all of space?” Blaine searches the sky. “Besides the sun and the moon, it’s the brightest object in the night sky, and it’s named after the Roman goddess of love and beauty -”

Kurt swallows, willing himself to look away - because he can’t _think_ it -

“Venus,” he says, an edged whisper.

“Yes!” Blaine shouts, and his hand is now enclosed over Kurt’s, fingers fitting together. Both of their hands chilled, iced, but together and suddenly the cold air is bearable.

Through his boots, in every bone, in his face along his flushed cheeks, he feels the winter. Blaine presses closer.

“It’s the brightest, but we call it our sister planet, because it’s so similar in size to Earth,” Blaine continues, still searching. “It has this thing called a transit, where it passes directly between the sun and Earth - there’s one this June - and after it disappears, Venus will return as a morning star.”

He sounds amazed, like he’ll always be amazed. If it meant never having to feel anything besides _this,_ ever again, Kurt would talk about the stars with him forever.

“So it changes?”

“Kinda incredible, right? How one week it rises after the sun, and the next it can rise before . .” Blaine sighs, dropping his chin to rest on his free hand. “Kurt, it’s so bright that during the day, if you look carefully, you might be able to see it, like a planet of daylight.”

Venus is in the sky above them, somewhere, shining and close but still so far away - and he thought he was the moon but maybe he’s wrong . . .

They don’t move, and Kurt wants to drop his head to Blaine’s shoulder and get closer - but every limb is locked tight.

Blaine smiles, and there’s a world out there that doesn’t want him to smile, and there’s an even bigger world that doesn’t want Kurt to love his smile.

Kurt returns it, because he does.

“You know, your smile - it’s ridiculous.” 

Flexing his fingers against Kurt’s, still beaming, Blaine asks, “Is that bad?”

Kurt turns their hands over, and with all the courage he has, the closest he’ll ever get to admitting it, says, "Not at all.”

The universe must be twisting itself, the stars fading themselves from view, because Blaine grins and it looks - different, new, melting, the breaking of a dawn. There’s the sun and the moon and the stars and Venus, but then there’s Blaine . .

-

They only come here when everybody else is in class, otherwise it’s too crowded and loud. Everything is coated in a blanket of snow, the courtyard a mix of black, grey and white. Quinn uses her arm to brush the steps off, clearing them a place to sit.

She’s a bundle of black against the snow, her sweater thick and her hair covered with a beanie, and she leans back, using her one ungloved hand to bring a cigarette to her lips.

And Kurt is smiling uncontrollably. It’s freezing, and his face feels tight with the cold, but he couldn’t make his smile disappear if somebody physically tried to force it off.

He stares out at the empty courtyard and covers his mouth with his hand, not moving until there’s a pressure at his back, and he turns around to see Quinn’s boot nudging him.

Her eyes curious, she says, “God, Kurt, you’re creeping me out.” and nudges him again.

It’d be impossible to make it disappear but maybe he should control it. “Sorry, I -” but suddenly his breath feels too quick and he’s smiling _wider_.

He woke up to a message this morning and he hasn’t been able to stop ever _since_ -

_Guess who was up all night making you flashcards about the solar system._

Kurt had replied, sitting up in bed, thumbs hovering over his phone, mouth helplessly tugging to the side - _Please don’t say you. I refuse to deal with Mr. Cranky Pants today._

Moments like that make him forget why he was ever afraid in the first place. They can touch him and hurt him and think what they want to think, but at the end of the day - the start to his morning - he has this, he has Blaine -

These are also the moments where he thinks _fuck_.

This is the same kid who wears Iron Man underwear, and his ringtone is the Pokémon theme song, and when he laughs he snorts and he just happens to know what the world’s fastest roller coaster is off the top of his head -

And he loves him.

“Quinn.”

He can’t look at her, sees from the corner of his eye as she lifts her head. His heart is stuck in his throat, walls closing in, constricting and he can’t breathe and before his courage leaks out, he says, all at once -

“I think I’m in love.”

Time hangs, still as the snow on the ground, still as Kurt’s heart, and there’s no way of knowing if it’s an eternity or a second before either of them move.

A trail of smoke drifts from her cigarette as she pulls it from her mouth, and then she snorts through her nose, breath coming out in a cloud. “With what?”

His smile must be reaching a dangerous level - is it possible to hurt yourself from smiling so much? Kurt covers it with his scarf, shuts his eyes and tries to will it away.

But she knows, of course she knows who, and he should be panicking but he doesn’t want to.

When he says nothing, Quinn blows more smoke out, sighs, and he should definitely be panicking now -

“Okay, wait, I'm sorry but did you just say something stupid?” Quinn sneers. “Or am I imagining it?”

He’s never said the words out loud, he hardly ever thought them. He only felt them. And god, he felt them - and he can’t define them, he can’t make them make sense, not to her, not to himself -

Kurt drops his head, says behind his hand, “I can’t explain it.”

“Good. Don’t.”

His throat has dried up, and he rasps, “Quinn -” and it’s not panic he’s feeling, but . . . regret.

Quinn moves quickly, arm flicking out as she stabs the end of her cigarette into the snow. She speaks even quicker, pink lips set in a thin line, “So tell me, Kurt. Whatever happened to it being nothing?”

Her voice, colder than ice, prickling underneath his skin. It’s not hard to remember that day on the bleachers, and how he had insisted like his life depended on it that none of it was true -

But back then his heart beat solely in fear, and now . . .

Her glare is - acidic. Kurt squirms underneath it, every atom he’s made of shifting in a different direction, wanting to move and run but being frozen in place. All he can do is look away, kick at the snow with his boot.

Suddenly he wishes the courtyard were full of people so it wouldn’t be so silent - and this isn’t the kind of silence he felt under the billions of stars with Blaine. This is his whole heart being stretched out, and having to wait until Quinn takes a pair of scissors to it - waiting and waiting because she’s not saying anything and he doesn’t know what she’ll do -

What she’s thinking -

“Oh god.” And then it’s not silence, it’s not waiting, because the pieces of Quinn’s mind clashing together could be heard for miles. She says, high and bewildered, almost laughing, “Holy shit. You’re _fucking_.”

Maybe it’s his heart snapping back into a solid shape, maybe it’s the weight of the words he _just_ said crashing back down, maybe it is just sheer panic, because Kurt spins to his side, mouth twisted angry as he yells, “Quinn! That’s not -”

Overlapping him, laugh metallic and bitter; “Sex isn’t love Kurt! I could have told you that!”

He forces it all down, because if he can’t say this without splitting in half she’ll never believe him. “That’s not it.”

Shame fills him like cement - he feels heavy, and against the white canvas of the world, so _seen._

Everything cold but her eyes, like two points of fire as she stares at him.

“Kurt you don’t know what love is,” she says, quietly, voice gone thin with everything she must be holding back. Funny how they could know each other for a thousand years but never really _know_ each other. “ _I_ know what -” Hand through her bangs, pressing her face against her wrist, she spits, “That isn't love.”

Overhead the sky is clouded, the snow beginning to pick back up. Behind the grey are thousands of stars, but where are they now, he needs -

Kurt tries to heave out his breath, wets his lips, feeling too hot but too cold, and just minutes ago he couldn’t stop smiling, and now he hardly has the strength to breathe.

“So you’re the love expert now?” he asks, slowly, throat too empty without the presence of his heart. “Is that it?”

All his life he’s been fighting, and he’s so tired of people making him feel things he doesn’t want to.

If this is Quinn’s reaction . . .

“Yes, actually.”

He didn’t think it would go this way, he doesn’t have any defense, he doesn’t have any weapons, so he mutters with as much spite as he can manage, “Because you have such a great history.”

Quinn pushes herself to her feet, shaking her head, wearing a mask of pain that must be similar to his own.

“I’m trying to help you, Kurt,” she says, calmly, fire in her eyes extinguished. “If you want to make my mistakes then be my guest.”

Quinn who guards her mistakes with her life, because Kurt only knows _one_ \- and it’s not like he can get knocked up.

She looks around the courtyard, everywhere but Kurt, and bites hard on her lip before hurrying out, “Tell you what. Come out with us.”

Kurt crosses his arms tight, stares at her feet and shakes his head. “Not a chance in hell.”

“God, Kurt. Can I be blunt?” she snaps, almost sounding hysterical, and she finally looks at him. “You’re being an idiot. Come out, and you’ll see that you’re not in _love_ -”

Kurt stares at her, face blank, wants to glare and scowl but she stole his willpower a long time ago. He’s never seen her so riled up, feathers ruffled and then set ablaze, frantic and infuriated as her eyes flicker over him.

He trusts her. There’s no one else to trust . .

This entire time and he’s never doubted what he felt, not really. He’s denied it.

But if she’s right, wouldn’t it make sense to make sure? Before he tells -

If this is her reaction . . .

He needs to make sure because he’s felt the world come to pieces underneath his feet before. And he swore never again, not willingly.

-

Music pounds loudly in his hears.

No, not music.

Singing. People are singing, _already_ , words mixing and voices wavering, moving in what might be dancing, but is most likely drunken fumbling.

Kurt stands to the side, pressing as far into the wall as he can, hoping maybe that he’ll become one with it. He holds himself awkwardly, neck straining to keep further back, like he has every single time he’s come here.

He’s not sure what people think they do here. But whatever it is, they stay away, so it must be working.

Didn’t want to be here then, doesn’t want to be here now. The music, a hum underneath the slurred voices, is awful, and Kurt hopes everyone here knows that there’s a fine line between _tastefully_ dressing like - well, a skank - and whatever rags they’re wearing.

Quinn could be right, because it’s not like he has a clue what he’s doing in the first place. He’s gone into it blindly, felt and felt and tried not to feel, and he ended up in a state of fear that left him in pieces. He’s not going to do it again, he’ll never let himself be hurt like that.

He wants him, and he can say that in his own head without wanting to evaporate, but if he puts it into words that aren’t ready to be heard - that won’t be heard the right way - it’s raising the gun and aiming it at himself.

Tilting his head, scared to make the slightest movement, Kurt scans the crowd. People that he doesn’t know, who don’t know him, and what is he even looking for? Another body to touch his?

Who else could touch him like that -

Nobody liked him, not for who he was and what he liked. The world looked down on Kurt Hummel and thought what they wanted and decided he wasn’t worth it. Kurt Hummel who loved music and performing and clothes - god he loves clothes - and who was wrong for _liking_ what he liked.

And he clung to whatever it was keeping him up until one day it wasn’t enough.

No saviour. Nothing to keep him from falling over. Just his dissolving heart, and he was finally pushed too hard, so when it beat it landed against nothing. Because if you can’t stand up and move, what do you do to stay safe . . ?

He likes to think underneath his skin he’s the same. He still likes what he likes.

Only, he was an idiot to think that just because he disappeared that they would stop hating him. All it took was one kiss and suddenly everyone remembered -

Against the wall, he looks to his feet, because smiling while looking at the crowd feels wrong. But he never could control his smile when he thought about Blaine.

Every time he had something, he lost it, and he gave up. Pushing his future away because he couldn’t grasp it.

All those hands belonging to faceless bodies, when they shoved him over the edge, he never stopped falling. And now - he’s lost, in deep black darkness.

Kurt lifts his head, hits it against the wall and smiles up at the ceiling instead. Because now he has Blaine.

Blaine; patient, understanding, seeing him and seeing _something._

Seeing him maybe because Blaine is the brightness that’s illuminating this deep black darkness.

He’s -

Venus.

He thought this was it. You come here, to this bar, and become something else, and nobody remembers it when you leave.

The rest of the girls dance and they drink and they snicker in disgust over something.

He looks around, fully, perhaps for the first time. He knows not one of them. All he sees are people who don’t know what they’re doing. Whatever answer he’s looking for, it’s not here.

Back then he didn’t think about it - he just did. All these people searching for something that they’re never going to find, not here, and maybe that’s why none of them know what they’re doing.

What was he looking for, when he was shoved into a stall and had a stranger’s mouth over his? They want me, this has to be right, everyone’s doing it -

But nobody really knows what they’re looking for here.

Quinn wants him to find something, someone. Someone to - Kurt grinds his teeth, switches his eyes down so he doesn’t have to take in the flashing lights, the moving bodies, the hands he does not want on him.

God, not again, never again, he was _young_ -

And wasn’t that it? The pressure they place on you until you crack and do something that you wouldn’t, that you shouldn't. Because then it absolves them, making them feel better about the things they’re doing.

Quinn wants him to find somebody (somebody else) because . . .

He doesn’t really know her. Two souls in two bodies that have nothing, settling beside one another but never knowing if the other is still there, and he _does_ know that Quinn didn’t get the love she wanted.

But he knows her enough to understand that Quinn is Quinn - and Kurt is Kurt - and if she can’t have love than why should he?

Kurt dares one more glance around the spinning room, strangers and strangers but no answer, and nobody is Blaine.

If anything, this is the proof that threads his mind into one collective piece. The proof that holds his thoughts, his words, together.

I want him.

And did I make him wait too long?

There’s no strength needed in tearing himself off the wall, he moves with a charge in his bones, sparks in his mind, and he finds Quinn like it’s his life mission.

He says, gasping for air even though he hasn’t done anything, “I can’t, Quinn. This isn’t - I can’t -”

Quinn glares at him, and a look that’s usually hot as fire and piercing as ice washes over him and he feels _nothing_. It’s the breaking behind her eyes that settles strange in his stomach.

She brings a bottle to her lips, takes a sip, and says with a rasping voice, “You’ll never get it, Kurt.”

But he does get it.

He tugs his jacket over his shoulders as he enters the parking lot, exhales into the February air and runs a hand through his hair. Checks his pockets for his wallet, needs to call a cab home.

He breathes - relief is smacking him hard with every heartbeat.

And he gets it.

-

Zero hours of sleep, he hardly even blinked, and somehow he feels more awake than he ever has before.

Rather than sleeping, he did, however, clean his room, arrange his clothes, toss and turn in bed before getting up to arrange his clothes once more - and funny how now, sitting in front of his dresser, he hasn’t a clue what to wear.

The floor of his room is a mess again before he finally settles on an outfit. And as he tugs his boots on, lacing them tight against his jeans, he stares at his bed.

Even now there’s the phantom tug to his heart, the sick free fall of that day, but it’s easily overwhelmed by something else - and he’ll never fear again.

Chugs coffee like he needs it in his system more than his blood, chews more gum than he ever should, his fingers shake when he picks up a cigarette, and maybe he should have at least tried to sleep but who needs sleep when you feel this -

His dad never hesitated in giving him his car back. Kurt had told him, not meeting his eye, _I need it_ \- and his dad knew without knowing, so with a promise of at least _trying_ , Kurt could drive himself to school.

And Kurt does try - doesn't anyone see that - he wants to do good -

Soon the school year will end, and Kurt’s spent so much time being afraid, that the future wasn’t something he focused on. But he’s not scared anymore. How could he be?

Looking into the rear view mirror and he can see that his streaks are beginning to fade, he’ll have to touch them up soon; his face is pale, white, and his lips -

Have touched his, have touched him - and Kurt’s mouth pulls into a smile, blinking slowly at himself.

Shouldering his bag, he takes a deep breath, like he has every single day since that article came out, but today, it’s not fear holding his heart. The furthest thing from it, actually . . 

He steps through the school and he doesn’t fall. In these halls he’s been shoved, hurt, stared at - and his feet don’t slip, thud of his boots hitting heavy in his ears.

Blaine knows like he knows his own breath that anything they do to him will never change who he is. And whatever they do to Kurt - he’s tried - it won’t ever change how he feels for him.

Shove me. Hit me. I love him. Call me names. Hate me. I _love_ him -

And did I make you wait too long?

Maybe there is a bounce to his step, there isn’t a force on Earth that could keep him grounded. His smile flickers on and off, and he thinks _god they’re going to think you’ve gone soft, Kurt -_

Never could control your smile when you thought of him.

The bell rings, students pushing past him. Blaine would throw a fit if Kurt dragged him away from class. So he waits.

Kurt goes to his class, goes to his next class, tries to focus but he can’t because - what is he going to say? He never thought he’d be here, with the world around him a kaleidoscope, and denying is so much easier, so much safer, but how could he possibly deny when he feels so _much - ?_

Because now that the world is a thousand different colours, now that he knows there are billions of stars above him, safety would be nice but the world will never be the same if he lets this go.

When did this happen. At what point did Blaine stop being the tutor and start being the boy who gave Kurt that piece of control that he needed to fix onto his life?

He's always been him.

And when did Kurt stop being the boy who pushed away, who told Blaine over and over that it meant _nothing_ , who ignored the fracture in Blaine’s eyes every time he did because denying was so much easier?

He’s stopping now.

I’ve denied for so long but there’s nobody else, Blaine -

Waiting at the end of the hall, he sees Blaine by his locker. Rachel’s talking at his side, and right, they’re friends, he’s in glee club, Kurt likes to forget - but that’s not what this is about. They can all go screw themselves with a rusted fork for all he cares, it was never Blaine who hurt him.

Each step that he takes brings him closer, closer to him and closer to saying it. The countdown in his mind going down from ten, and he wouldn’t be surprised if a crowd of millions start to cheer when he finally reaches zero.

Not once does he think of the doubt. The consequences. The fall out. He’s felt falling before, but he had this to catch him.

Rachel leaves and he’s almost there, not sure where to start, what to say first, because there’s so much _to_ say, so when he’s finally standing in front of him he breathes, “Hi.”

Smiling wide and not fighting it, he’s fought too much -

“Hey,” Blaine says quietly, looks to his books, down the hall.

In the span of two seconds the world suspends, pauses, and the rift between them stretches a lightyear. Kurt freezes, swallows it down, he won’t feel fear again and there is nothing to worry about - since the last time they saw each other nothing has happened, unless . .

Except that courage that’s so freshly built is so easy to crumble; the only thing thing guarding every feeling beating mad in his heart. He doesn’t let his face fall, though, because he never could control his smile when he thought of Blaine.

He twists his hands together, fiddles with the hem of his shirt, soft grey fabric in knots between his fingers. “Change of plans. Maybe instead of tutoring this Friday, we could . .  do something different?”

He looks up and Blaine’s face is blank. A stop sign to Kurt’s thunderous pulse, his speeding mind.

Blaine’s eyes are wide, unmoving, not looking but staring right through him, and he clears his throat but says nothing.

And Kurt feels every body part he has shutting down, one by one, until he’s nothing but a concrete wall with a hardly beating heart. Venom and fear mixing in his throat - Blaine’s not saying _anything_ \- he snaps, “ _What?_ ”

Blaine finally moves, the universe rippling with the motion, looks away and slides his glasses back up his nose. He says, a note above silence, a crack travelling through his voice, “Actually, Kurt - I, um, I think I’m busy Friday.”

No, no he’s not weak. He _is_ concrete and he will not bend, he said never again and he meant it - but maybe it’s the turn and flood of so much feeling, sinking him further, pressure tightening hard around him. 

“With what?”

But maybe he doesn’t want an answer.

Blaine stands taller, pulling his shoulders back, and his eyes only meet Kurt’s for a split second before they’re flickering away; armour on, defense lined in his ever bone. Kurt knows because he wears his own like a second skin.

Pins in his eyes, but Kurt won’t dare let them show - since when has he ever needed defense from me - ?

“Well, if you must know.” His voice isn’t his, cold and hard, each word sounding forced. “I might - I might have a date.”

Kurt was sure the world would stop as soon as he said his own words, but no. It stops then.

Thousands of colours all becoming one; muddled, grey, bleak.

Every ounce of feeling he’s ever had slams down on him. All the stars crashing, hitting his skin, impacting comets that he knows he’ll never repair from - Blaine once told him that the craters on the moon were from comets hitting too soon . . .

In the cloud of grey, the starless sky, all of a sudden not a thing makes sense. Did he sleep three months and miss something? It was just last week that they sat side by side, close, safe, together. Just a day or so ago that he knew with every vein in his body, ever artery in his heart, that he wanted him.

And - oh -

One last comet, hitting his core, shaking the ground he stands on. Did I make you wait too long -

“Oh.” He’s left wordless, breathless, the air smashed out of his lungs - Blaine’s eyes dart over him, widening but looking elsewhere, and he must see the grey sickness to Kurt’s cheeks, the dull of his eyes, he must see Kurt fading - “Um, who - ?”

If the entire time he’s been rearranging the shattered pieces of his mind, trying to resemble a picture, trying to make sense of his life and his heart, if this entire time he’s been falling head over fucking heels in love with Blaine -

And Blaine was out there falling in love with somebody else -

He feels sick. Hot and exposed and dizzy and he will _never live it down_.

Blaine looks sick too, his face red, and he nervously fumbles with his bowtie, pushes his lips together tight before saying, “A guy, in my old study group - he’s been asking for a while - and I -”

Not just sick, but nervous, and why would he be nervous when it’s Kurt who has everything to lose -

“Why’d you say yes?” he spits out, breathing now rapid, chest tight and constricting and something hot branding behind his eyes.

And if his mind were running on a functional track maybe he wouldn’t say it, but he deserves an answer, or else these shattered pieces won’t ever fit together again.

It’s his own fault, he shouldn’t be so spiteful, he shouldn’t feel like he’s decaying when he’s the one who waited too long - but he wants him _so much._

He keeps one hand on the locker, needs something to ground him now. Can’t make his eyes look away from Blaine, sees the way he swallows thickly, the way his shoulders drop. This is Blaine who kisses him and holds him and Kurt’s given a piece of himself to him already, and he wanted to give him more -

But he was blind to the world outside his walls, outside his fences. Out there is something bigger, something better, and Blaine found it before he found Kurt.

“I mean, I thought we -” Kurt continues, voice split in two, throat hard from holding it all back. Because when you bottle up your words, say them in your head but not out loud, and then shake it; he has to get something out, he’s mixed up and angry and he needs to get _something_ out. “I thought we were -”

But he can’t.

“I thought that too.” Blaine’s expression sobers up, straining tight, a weak twitch of his mouth before pulling it into a stern line. With his eyes focused intently on Kurt’s, he says heavily, “But Kurt - if we were - you wouldn’t be - Quinn told me what you did.”

Kurt blinks, wishes he could rewind time for one second so he could hear him again. Disbelief pours like a waterfall over him, and he straightens his spine, folds his arms and closes his eyes, letting out an almost hysterical laugh that nearly breaks into a sob.

“Quinn told you what?”

Blaine falters, mouth falling open before he snaps it shut. “That you were - with somebody else and -”

Three times. Today he’s gone through three ground shaking, universe breaking stages of feeling. But this - pure, red anger - stomps over everything else, leaving love and loss in its path of destruction.

Too many reasons to feel such anger. There’s Quinn - _you’ll never get it, Kurt_ \- and why would she do this why would she and _when_ did she - ?

And there’s Blaine. Who should be the last person in this world to believe anything anybody else says about Kurt - because he knows Kurt, and he was the one to pull him up from the sinking world, and Blaine knows that Kurt can’t handle anybody else -

Blaine who knows the stars are there, but clearly Kurt’s galaxy of a heart went by unnoticed.

Eyes opening and closing, he sucks in a breath, fury raging mad in his lungs. “What did she - you know what? No. I don’t care. How could you _believe_ her -”

 _How could you_ \- he went out and found somebody else because he wanted to hurt Kurt right back - and Kurt never did anything besides love him.

To hurt Kurt back. Because - it’s not possible - did the idea of Kurt with anyone else destroy the orbit Blaine exists in?

Does that mean he feels - that he wants him just as much - ?

He thought Blaine knew him but apparently he only knew how to hurt him -

Kurt takes a step back, and when Blaine reaches out for him he flinches, shakes his head.

“Wait, Kurt, we need to talk about -”

Kurt steps further away.

Hands itching to touch something, to push something away. Pricks of tears burn hot and he can’t control them, can only blink and choke back the fire in his throat. “No, Blaine - how could - I’m done.”

Those weren’t the words he wanted to say today.

Blaine reaches again, but orbits knocking, fighting, and Kurt only goes further. He leaves quickly, the planet he stands on crumbling.

Heart on the very edge of giving in for so long, months of wanting him but never allowing it. Living in fear and finally finding courage, almost having him but repelling him away.

It was never really Blaine who was waiting too long.

The void of space. No stars. No moon. No light. No sound.

No Blaine.

And suddenly.

Darkness.


End file.
